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Welcome to OU's Player of the week, a thread where I interview well known players to gain insight on how they battle, as well as get to know some things about them. The goal of this thread is to have these high level players give insight to other players in this community in hopes of creating a better overall experience in the OU environment. As always, if theres someone youd like to see interviewed, feel free to shoot me a PM. So without further ado, lets get to it!

BKC
Being a DPP/ADV fanatic, winning Smogon Tour 16, hating BW, listening to Slayer, having a massive crush on Vine star The Gabbie Show
Favorite Pokémon:
Ever since my first battle with Elite 4 Drake about a decade ago where I got crushed by his Salamence, I knew I had to have one. It was so strong, and it looked so cool... I ran Fly / Dragon Claw / Fire Blast / Flamethrower, it was brutal. I have a lot of favorites but Mence takes the cake in this regard. I was so happy when they gave him a beastly Mega.
Most Used Pokémon:
In XY, I love Mega Manectric; it's so fast, it's powerful, great coverage, momentum machine with Volt Switch, Intimidate is amazing. In BW and DPP I'm rarely seen without my trusty Scarf Tyranitar, although I actually use different sets of his in the latter gen. In ADV it's probably Suicune, he's so consistently good at what he does it's ridiculous.
Do the letters in your name stand for anything? If so, what?
Blaziken is one of my favorite mons and when I was 12 I thought the name "blaze kickin chicken" was awesome, so that's what I used when I signed up for youtube. I remember Sucker4Jessica always said blazin instead of blaze so that's what I used when I made my smogon account. Gouki said I had the best username on the forums at one point

How and when did you get into competitive battling?
Like most middle-class suburban white kids, I had a huge pokemon phase in my younger years, slowly falling out of it as I got older and got more interested in baseball / basketball / girls. In 2007, in 6th grade at the age of 11, this new friend I'd made asked if I liked pokemon and whether I'd played diamond and pearl yet. I hadn't, but if pokemon was gonna be cool again, I was totally gonna jump back in! So I went home and looked up all the new mons. I remember Infernape, Staraptor, Luxray and Garchomp standing out the most. I looked up some wifi battles on youtube and stumbled upon the legendary Marriland vs. Untouchable battle which wowed me with the idea of competitive pokemon's advanced tactics, as I'd grown bored of killing the E4 repeatedly. I decided I wanted to post my own wifi battles but I sadly wasn't 13 yet, so I had to wait! In the year and a half wait, I learned all I could about EVs and IVs, so when I turned 13 and the English version of Pokemon Platinum came out, I was ready to go. My first team was Specs Empoleon / SR Gliscor / double spikes Cloyster / Taunt Roar Rest T-Wave shiny Gyarados @ Chesto / SD Pursuit Weavile / mixed Flareon. The Gliscor had a Lax nature since I wanted +Def but didn't have the patience to wait for Impish, and the Cloyster somehow died to a Dark Pulse from Spiritomb which was ridiculous. However this team netted me a victory in my first ever wifi battle, which was against the user fabdoghouse98 in May 2009.
Eventually I migrated to forums to look for new battlers. GameFAQs and Marriland were pretty popular among the Youtube scene. I also hung around Pokecentral101 and RegiLeague, who had guys who even played on Smogon, which was like forbidden, scary territory. However in one of Marriland's video descriptions where he claimed to not be that good, he said to go to Smogon if you wanted to face really good players, so eventually I did, and the rest is history.
What’s your favorite playstyle and why?
Semistall (or stall-based-balance for the purists). I like making unbreakable stall teams as much as the next guy but the lack of offensive presence will bite you in the ass against good players. With semistall you have a solid defensive core but can actually dish out damage which makes it a lot more dangerous.
What was your favorite Generation of OU to play and why?
The Latias / Salamence DPP OU metagame was my first and remains my favorite. I'm sure I'm wearing nostalgia goggles but I've never not had fun playing it.
What is your initial opinion on ORAS?
Fun! Lots of fun new shit to try out, so much that it'll keep everyone busy for a while trying to find the next innovation. My inner fanboy screamed with delight at some of the new megas.
What is your opinion on Greninja? Do you find him OP? Any other mons you feel are a bit too much for OU?
Greninja reminds me of BW Garchomp. It's absolutely amazing but not broken. Nothing else really sticks out to me as busted although I fucking hate Scald.
What is your stance on the team matchup issue?
Usually used as an excuse by poor players to cover for shitty play and/or team (choice). What I mean by the latter is that if your team is weak to a common threat and you run into it, you're just full of shit. If you pick your favorite bog-standard style of team in a tournament and face a guy who brings something that runs all over it, you have no room to whine either.
It does exist for sure, but if you're smart with your team choice and are all over the other guy in-game, you should be able to outplay him, or maybe be aggressive enough to scare him into making mistakes (it helps if you're well-known and have some intimidation factor to you, or if you're good at rattling people with words). I've had a few games where I thought the matchup was unwinnable and came out on top; for example, in a WCoP 2013 qualifier game, I brought rain stall (like an idiot) and my opponent brought sand stall. I immediately started bitching in the channel about how I couldn't possibly win but my East boys yelled at me to fight like a man and I somehow won. God bless CTC's Hurricane Dragonite.
With SPL coming up in just over a month, are there any players who you feel will make a name for themselves?
ben gay has been mentioned by a few guys and for good reason, his potential is through the roof. I think aim and Tesung will further solidify themselves as well. sebixxl somehow went 4-0 in WCoP without anyone noticing and is doing well in OLT so I'd bet on him kicking people's shit in. Reymedy had an amazing WCoP 2013 performance but has sort of struggled since then; however, I think this season is where he really breaks out. Moreso than just his BW skills, he has a will to want to win, which is incredibly valuable and a lot rarer than you'd think.
Do you have any advice for people who are trying to get into big tournaments like SPL, WCoP, etc?
Practice a lot, it really makes a difference - I used to be the most mediocre ADV player you could possibly imagine. People will notice good tour performances, you don't have to win every open for someone to notice you know your shit at other tiers. Being capable of building your own teams will further help with this. It'll help massively if you're multi-dimensional knowing a variety of different tiers / gens and the various styles in them is good for you and your team. Also being a generally nice person is underrated, the environment is a big part of how great teams mesh and push each other to succeed. If you played sports as a kid, your coach probably drilled it into your head how it was important to be a good teammate - it applies here too!
Do you have any advice for newer players in general? What about new users on Smogon?
For the former, watch the greats and learn from them. I "grew up" so to speak in DPP admiring guys like Earthworm and Gouki, then went back and learned ADV from watching dudes like gene and goofball - obviously the list of people I learned from and hold in high regard is much more extensive but here's not the place to go in-depth. Anyway these guys were so good, almost every move they made I was impressed by, they were really in a league of their own. Nowadays the same holds true for dudes like Bloo, McM, gr8, cbb, etc, although if anyone'd like I can compile a list of all the impressive XYers I've watched - they're not exactly a dime a dozen but there certainly isn't a shortage of them either!
For the latter, lurk a lot and don't stick your face where it doesn't belong. No one wants to hear your opinion on GSC Snorlax if your GSC experience is watching a few SPL games.
What players do you look up to / are good friends with?
I won't go into detail about every single player who's had an influence on me since there are a fuckload of those although feel free to ask me about them! Right now I have the fortune to be great friends with some of the game's best players - Bloo, McM, gr8, cbb, Sweepage, aim, Dekzeh, and a fuckload of others. Special mention to bro fist for being a fucking monster both in terms of mons and in terms of putting up with me for 5 years ever since I was an eager little 13 year old. Oh yeah another mention to Flamethrowa, only a few people will know him but those people will tell you he was a beast and I learned a lot from him. I hope you're doing good if you by some chance read this Danny!!
Oh and the legendary poops boobs.
Finally, is there a team that you can show us that is a good fit for this metagame with a brief explanation of how it works?
Haven't played ORAS so here's my XY team!
Landorus-T (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Intimidate
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Atk / 252 Def
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- U-turn
- Knock Off
Klefki (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Prankster
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Def / 252 SDef
IVs: 0 Atk
Calm Nature (+SDef, -Atk)
- Spikes
- Thunder Wave
- Heal Block
- Foul Play
Clefable (F) @ Leftovers
Trait: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 HP / 152 Def / 104 SDef
IVs: 0 Atk
Calm Nature (+SDef, -Atk)
- Calm Mind
- Soft-Boiled
- Moonblast
- Flamethrower
Keldeo @ Leftovers
Trait: Justified
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
IVs: 0 Atk
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Substitute
- Calm Mind
- Scald
- Secret Sword
Latios (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 12 Atk / 252 SAtk / 244 Spd
IVs: 30 Atk / 30 SAtk / 30 Spd
Hasty Nature (+Spd, -Def)
- Draco Meteor
- Psyshock
- Earthquake
- Hidden Power [Fire]
Aerodactyl (M) @ Aerodactylite
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Aerial Ace
- Stone Edge
- Fire Fang
- Aqua Tail
Trait: Intimidate
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Atk / 252 Def
Impish Nature (+Def, -SAtk)
- Stealth Rock
- Earthquake
- U-turn
- Knock Off
Klefki (M) @ Leftovers
Trait: Prankster
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Def / 252 SDef
IVs: 0 Atk
Calm Nature (+SDef, -Atk)
- Spikes
- Thunder Wave
- Heal Block
- Foul Play
Clefable (F) @ Leftovers
Trait: Magic Guard
EVs: 252 HP / 152 Def / 104 SDef
IVs: 0 Atk
Calm Nature (+SDef, -Atk)
- Calm Mind
- Soft-Boiled
- Moonblast
- Flamethrower
Keldeo @ Leftovers
Trait: Justified
EVs: 4 Def / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
IVs: 0 Atk
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Substitute
- Calm Mind
- Scald
- Secret Sword
Latios (M) @ Life Orb
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 12 Atk / 252 SAtk / 244 Spd
IVs: 30 Atk / 30 SAtk / 30 Spd
Hasty Nature (+Spd, -Def)
- Draco Meteor
- Psyshock
- Earthquake
- Hidden Power [Fire]
Aerodactyl (M) @ Aerodactylite
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Aerial Ace
- Stone Edge
- Fire Fang
- Aqua Tail
Made this to try out Mega Aero, who's a pretty vicious attacker, and Klefki, a nice switch-in to the dangerous Mega Gardevoir who could throw down Spikes and slow down setup sweepers with priority Thunder Wave, Thundurus-style. Heal Block on it is really cute, makes the hazard damage that much more dangerous. Bulky Landorus-T is so reliable at getting SR and checking physical attackers, with U-turn to maintain momentum and get my offensive dudes in for free. He can't counter Bisharp, however, which is where Keldeo comes in. Originally it was the standard Specs set, but after noticing how it could use a SubCM set extremely effectively, allowing it to win CM wars against Clefable and Suicune via Secret Sword, I made the switch and haven't looked back. Latios is almost impossible to not use imo, he's so great both offensively and defensively. Originally I had Roost to switch into Keldeo a few times but didn't find myself using or needing it horribly often so I threw on Earthquake to help eliminate Heatran which helps out Clefable, who was added for its ability to counter Greninja while functioning as an effective sweeper. It's never defensively pressured by opposing Latios thanks to Klefki completely walling it, which is awesome. It might not be the most ~optimal build~ but it's a lot of fun and went 2-0 in OLT playoffs!
Feel free to ask me anything! Keep in mind your chances of getting an interesting answer skyrocket if you ask about other stuff, although I'm happy to discuss most things mons of course ^_____^
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So there it is. If you have any questions for BKC, feel free to ask him in the thread. I'd like to thank him once again for doing this, and see you next week!